One of the frequently discussed topics of modern conspiracy theories is the so-called “Mandela effect” - that is, like “pseudo-memories” that millions of people are obsessed with today.
Scientists adherents say that all this is a consequence of poor education (and sometimes it really is), but in fact, people around the planet discover hundreds of such “effects” literally every day, making them suspect that either someone is imperceptibly changing the world, or someone quietly rewrites our memory. But which version is more correct?
It is possible that the popular scientific edition nautil.us will help us to answer this question, which published material about a sensational breakthrough in understanding the principles of memory.
According to modern official views, memory is a certain structure of neuronal synapses: neurons either connect to each other in a special order, or “pump” some selected connections, as a result of which they form a certain special area, which is, as it were, a memory block. Molecular biologists have had great doubts about such views for a long time, and now it seems that these doubts have been confirmed.
In the 1950s, James McConnell, professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, began experiments on freshwater flatworms called planaria, known for their phenomenal regeneration. Planaria can be cut into dozens of pieces, which then turn into 50 independent organisms.
However, the professor did not stop at cutting, but began to train the worms, stabbing them with an electric current, accompanied by flashing lights. As a result, the worms began to react to alternating light: as soon as the lamp above the aquarium began to blink, they immediately reeled away and buried themselves in the sand deeper.
Since this reflex was definitely a sign of learning, the professor cut the worm in half to see where the memory of the electric shocks was stored - in the head or in the tail?
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But, as it turned out, the memory of the regenerated planarians was stored EVERYWHERE. Even if the worm was cut into many parts, all individuals who recovered from these parts remembered training very well. And this indicated that a certain substance, distributed throughout the body, is responsible for memory.
The search for this substance did not receive much development, but in the 1960s the Swedish neuroscientist Holger Gyden suggested that memories are stored in neuronal cells, in particular in RNA, a messenger molecule that receives instructions from DNA and binds to ribosomes to synthesize those or other proteins. And, as it turned out, his theory was confirmed, and from a very unexpected side.
For the experiment, he used all the same planarian, from which, after training, he isolated RNA. But already at the very beginning of the experiment, the professor had a problem: RNA can be injected into a laboratory rabbit, but how to inject RNA from planaria?
Holger Gyden solved the problem simply: first, he trained a selected group of planarians, then grinded them into jelly and fed the growing up with this soup. As a result, the new generation of planarians fully absorbed the experience of the eaten relatives and also began to react to light.
In the 1970s, similar experiments were already carried out on mice - and there the transfer of information also worked perfectly. Moreover, both with RNA injections and with cannibalism - that is, when the mice were allowed to eat a dish prepared from their relatives trained to run through the maze.
After receiving these results, academicians from neurobiology gathered at the convention, where they began to drag each other by the beards, beat each other on the head with decanters and furniture. Ultimately, a reconciling version was developed, according to which RNA molecules (or some other substance) are responsible for long-term memory, and synapses form short-term memory. On that, after shaking hands and apologizing for the injuries inflicted, the academicians decided.
And so, as nautil.us writes, in 2015, a team of neuroscientists from the University of California at Los Angeles, led by David Glanzman, repeated all the old experiments with planaria, only using instead of them aplysia - molluscs, which are often called bearded seals:
A similar work began by the team at the Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University, led by Douglas Blackstone, only instead of shellfish they were tormented by insects. But the results were the same everywhere.
Moreover, what surprised the researchers most of all, if a caterpillar is trained (for example, forcing it to sniff a certain substance and subject it to an electric shock) - the butterfly that turns out from this caterpillar will remember everything. And this despite the fact that in the caterpillar-chrysalis-butterfly cycle, the caterpillar turns into jelly and there even RNA is somehow utilized.
All this casts doubt on even the theory of memory transfer by RNA molecules, and even the theory of synapses leaves no stone unturned. And now teams of adepts have banded together, received hefty grants and moved on to broader experiments, including on mammals like humans.
Without even looking into the crystal ball, we can accurately predict the results of these experiments. We read nkj.ru:
There are a million such stories today, and people who hear them for the first time begin to pray in fear, telling about the “soul transplant”. But in fact, there is no soul transplant here - just a transplantation into the body of a certain substance, which is the information carrier, is taking place.
And this substance does not necessarily need to be injected into the blood - the donor of knowledge can simply be devoured. This, in particular, representatives of the species Homo sapiens have been doing for centuries. For example, the Japanese during ww2 still practiced the custom of eating the liver of a defeated enemy and there is even a documented case when samurai ate a whole platoon of gallant American pilots.
Customs do not arise from scratch and information about what was eaten is somehow transmitted, and most likely RNA has nothing to do with it. For example, the Indians of Brazil in the middle of the last century (possibly even now) practiced the custom of cremating local especially enlightened people, whose ashes were then consumed by the whole tribe with banana porridge. Perhaps that's why Brazil is famous for eternally famous for its football players - they simply burn the champions and then devour the ashes, although we do not know for sure.
The main thing is that other people's memories can be transmitted to a person either with food, or with vaccinations, or even with the air - this is a proven scientific fact. The officials are still just studying this fact, but not the officials, most likely, have been sawing the topic since 1950 and did not limit themselves to planarians. And in 70 years they should have received some serious results.
Therefore, if you ever have the “Mandela effect” and your memory will be different from the memory of those around you, or if all of a sudden those around you become imbued with incredible love for their supreme leader, and you will not share this love - you will wonder: what did they use before ? After all, memory, as we have shown above, can most likely be synthesized and easily mixed into water and food.